Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Today I attended the annual MSAC Arts in Education Selection Conference. This year it was held again at the Howard County Arts Council in Ellicott City. The conference is held to give schools and artists a chance to network and plan for the upcoming AIE grant cycle.

I was surprised to see handful of schools that were represented. In fact the whole event was pretty well empty in relationship to past year's events. Usually I have 15-20 new contacts when I leave the place and today, 5 new folks!

It was also good to meet the new MSACAIE program director, a writer whose name is Christina Stewart. Thanks for the pic Chris! After she welcomed everyone to the conference, she announced that there have been a few changes to the program for next year. Most amazing, is the fact that all artists now MUST have a certificate of insurance on file at the MSAC office proving that we carry liability coverage of 1 million dollars.

I love these unfunded mandates. I remember when the Bush administration passed nclb and the schools were crying about this sort of thing. Now they are doing the same to the artists who offer residencies in the communities.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Our focus was to identify the key components to a healthy bay, it’s floor, water and watershed. Together we identified important organisms that live in the bay’s environment and created drawings and paintings to represent them. The mural came together as a powerful depiction of the interdependence of all who live in Chesapeake Bay watershed.

More than 120 students, faculty, staff and PTA volunteers collaborated on the 14ft x 12ft artwork’s concept, design and painting.

Followers

To teach is to learn twice

Visual artist, Social Justice activist, educator and traveler,
UU.
For 25 years I have offered visual arts projects in communities with a focus on creative literacy, community collaboration and arts integrated curriculum. Our projects have been successful in schools with grades 3-12 and with multi generational, multicultural and interfaith communities in diverse settings.